Why Lady Bosses Are the Best

Despite what pop culture would have you believe.

All this week, ELLE.com will be unpacking what we've dubbed the Work Life issue—as in, the tricky subtext that informs everything other than the actual mechanics of the jobs we're paid to do.

Nobody likes a female boss. At least that's what you'd think from looking at a 2014 Gallup poll, which showed both men and women prefer male bosses. What's surprising—and depressing—is that women prefer male bosses more than men do. 39 percent of women say they'd prefer a male boss compared to just 26 percent of men. And no wonder: The pop cultural depiction of ladies in charge is generally abysmal. From the condescending Wall Street backstabber Katharine Parker in Working Girl to the power bitch magazine editor Miranda Priestly in The Devil Wears Prada—and even the capricious cynic website chief Moira in my own novel, Sad Desk Salad—lady bosses have a bad rap.

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I am pretty sure these preferences are based, in part, on outdated stereotypes of women in power as "bitchy" and "emotional." But as someone who has had almost exclusively female bosses, I can tell you that those stereotypes couldn't be further from the truth. My superiors have been supportive, intuitive, and wise. They taught me how to be a better worker, but just as often, they taught me how to be a better person. I'm sure there are many male bosses out there who are as attuned to their underlings as my female bosses, but the criticism that women in charge are "emotional" could just as easily be a strength as a weakness.

Anna Holmes was my first life-changing female boss. She hired me at Jezebel when I was an eager but inexperienced 25-year-old. I learned a lot from her about writing, idea generation, and the creation of truly unique content. But the most important thing I learned from her was how to admit I was wrong—in public.

I remember making a flippant, ignorant comment about Orthodox Jews in a post I wrote. I got chastised about it by commenters and friends of the site, as I should have been. At first I was defensive, because I was ashamed. I remember thinking, but I'm Jewish! As if that gave me a pass. But then Anna called me about it. Though I can't remember the specifics of what we discussed on the phone, she made me feel like it wasn't the end of the world, but also that I should correct the transgression. I wrote a follow-up post the next day apologizing, and while it was painful and embarrassing, it was the right thing to do. The episode taught me that being to own up to your mistakes is an essential quality for a writer, but also for an adult human.

Two other female bosses—Hanna Rosin and Emily Bazelon at Slate—taught me, through word and deed, more about work and family than any number of zeitgeisty books ever could. Both women are journalistic powerhouses, writing best-selling, culture-shifting books. They're also both mothers. Hanna has three children, and Emily has two. They were my bosses long before my daughter was born, and I saw how they functioned. They both worked incredibly hard, but very flexibly, from multiple cities and from home, and they always made a lot of time to see their kids and do things for them. I will never forget the image of Hanna storing her freshly pumped breast milk on a window ledge during a cold January day when she couldn't find a fridge. It was nothing short of inspiring.

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But they didn't just take time for themselves and their families. Though I wasn't a mom when I worked for them, they treated me like I was entitled to a real life as long as my work got done on deadline and well. There was no micromanaging of my hours, or guilt trips about taking vacations. There was only encouragement of true balance. When I did become pregnant, though it was a fraught pregnancy and a difficult time for me, they were there to support me (Even when it involved saying, "You are out of your fucking mind.")

None of this is to say that there aren't great male bosses out there, or that, if you're female, you need a woman mentor or sponsor to feel secure and to succeed. But everyone, no matter what their gender, needs the support of their superiors at some point along the way. And perhaps it's easier to forge a deep connection with another woman, the kind that gives you enough faith in yourself to go for what you want. I'm lucky in that I got that in abundance.